The present invention relates to cellular telephone communications systems and specifically to an airborne cellular telephone communications system that provides seamless global in-flight coverage.
Use of cellular telephones and other wireless data devices on board aircraft has been banned by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and restricted by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). The FCC ban is in place to avoid interference with terrestrial cellular systems while an aircraft flies over a cellular network. The FAA regulations restrict the use of cell phones on an aircraft to ensure against interference to onboard communications and navigation equipment. The FCC recently has announced that it is going examine relaxing its ban on cell phone use in aircraft. A relaxation in the FCC rules will still be subject to the rules and policies of the FAA and aircraft operators.
The FCC is proposing to permit airborne use of cell phones and other wireless devices at the devices lowest power settings under control of a pico cell located on the aircraft and only if such operation does not interfere with terrestrial cellular systems. In small cell phone networks pico cells are the smallest of radio cells. Pico cells often extend to just a few hundred meters in diameter in ground applications. Pico cells are generally used to fill in areas of poor coverage or provide coverage in remote locations where there is not standard cellular service available. On board an aircraft a cell phone user makes a call that goes to the pico cell. The pico cell then communicates from the aircraft using a transceiver to a ground station or to a satellite and from the satellite to a ground station and to finally connect to a public switched telephone network (PSTN).
While the pico cell system offers a solution for onboard aircraft installations, a need exists among passengers to use cell phones globally through such satellite communications systems (SATCOM) as Globalstar and Inmarsat. It is also desirable to have a pico cell system that operates with all popular cell phone standards such as CDMA, GSM, 2.5G, 3G and others for true global service compatibility.
Globalstar is a mobile satellite voice and data communications service that covers North America and 120 countries worldwide. Globalstar uses a low earth orbit (LEO) satellite system to provide mobile satellite communications services to hand-held and vehicle-mounted user equipment. Globalstar utilizes a version of code division multiple access (CDMA) technology based upon the IS-95 CDMA standard to provide voice, data, and fax services.
Inmarsat is a global mobile satellite communications system that delivers phone, fax and data communications to ground, maritime and aeronautical users around the globe. Inmarsat operates a constellation of geostationary satellites to provide communications to every part of the world, except the Polar Regions.
Cell phones today are just beginning to enable high-speed data usage. The future will have even faster data ability with 2.5 and 3G phones requiring 80 kbps to greater than 1 Mbps. This currently surpasses current aircraft voice and data telephony capability. Existing SATCOM telephony system options are not capable of meeting the demand for fully supporting a plurality of 3G data enabled cell phones per aircraft in a region having hundreds or thousands of aircraft. Furthermore current services simply are not economical to the average consumer.
Current solutions proposed by industry players only offer partial coverage or performance solutions. There is a need for seamless global in-flight cell phone coverage. Furthermore, a need exists for an in-flight cell phone system capable of functioning with a variety of cell phone technologies. A need also exists for providing needed cell phone data rates at lowest costs.